>> Another thing - in B/D relationships, power and its asymmetrical
>> distribution are a desirable thing. Would you say that such
>> relationships are inconsistent with "love" ?
>
> In every relationship power can be asymmetrical and often is, and that
> asymmetry is often desirable, inspiring, seductive, pleasurable, fun.
>
> Catherine
...and entrapping, humiliating, despiriting, stifling, boring. The full range of human experience, in fact. I like what you are saying, and I think that I agree with it, but I start worry when people start talking about power like it's just another kind of breakfast. The "power is bad" crowd may be taediously moralistic but the more salient examples of power I can think of aren't exactly my cup of tea. As for the Foucault's weird crusade against those bad people who think 'truth is antithetical to power' - who thought this? It is such an unusual idea, one of Foucault's very own contributions if you ask me.
I liked Ian's comment that if power is in everything we do then there isn't much critical oomph left in the concept. Add that to Wojtek's observation that power is often a hollow term we use to annoy the powerful, and stir it with a healthy dose of Baffleresque appreciation of the ideology of ultracool capitalist subversion, and you are left with an ideal concept by which to advertise completely inoffensive criticism of 1950s sexual mores, and make a pretty penny.
Thiago Oppermann
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